


to the rest of the world

by GalaxyGhosty



Series: Commissions [2]
Category: Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Road Trip, Fluff and Humor, M/M, Slice of Life, Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-05
Updated: 2018-11-05
Packaged: 2019-08-19 11:01:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16533314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GalaxyGhosty/pseuds/GalaxyGhosty
Summary: AU. “We’ve come a long way, haven’t we?”





	to the rest of the world

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Mjb](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mjb/gifts).



> For[ missjbird78](https://missjbird78.tumblr.com/) on tumblr!
> 
> She commissioned me to do a fluffy Septiplier piece. It took me ages to finally work up the energy to do it (I have about 3 hours of free time a week, these days) so I ended up finishing it during one of my lectures. It's been ages since I wrote actual Septiplier so I admit it was a lot of fun! 
> 
> Road trips are cute, right? I love the aesthetic of them. It's my dream to be able to take a super long one, one day. But I'll settle for these good boys having one!
> 
> Hope y'all enjoy!

The sun is barely ducking its head below the horizon as Mark brings the car to a slow, smooth park. 

Warm, orange tones bathe the open landscape, the normally blue sky fading into a dusty pink and purple. He doesn’t actually know how long they’ve been driving, this time, the digital numbers on their watches and in the car ticking away with abandon they’re not paying attention to. 

Unbuckling his seatbelt, he reaches across the console, giving his partner’s knee a gentle squeeze. “Hey. Babe.” 

“I’m awake,” Jack says, eyes still closed, but the smile on his lips beautiful, blooming, perfect. Slowly, he opens them, revealing the brilliant blue, and Mark’s goddamn certain that’s where the blue in the sky went. “Where are we?”

“Uh,” Mark grabs his phone from the dash, unlocking it, pulling up his maps. He waits the few moments it take for it to recognize the reception, and lets the radar do its thing. “Montana, I think?”

“Damn,” Jack murmurs, sitting up straight in his seat. “We’ve come a long way, haven’t we?” 

“California and Montana aren’t too far apart. It just feels like it.”

Jack fishes his phone from his pocket. He’s silent for a long moment. “20 hours is pretty far, dude.” 

“You’re not the one driving.”

His favorite boy laughs, amused, glancing out the window towards the rapidly setting sun. His hand hovers over the unlock button of the door. “It never stops being sorta scary, you know? It’s like, every time we wake up, it’s somewhere new. Somewhere we don’t know. Somewhere that nobody knows our names, our faces. We’re eyes in a crowd. Lines of color, but not. Us. We can be whoever we want to be, out here.”

Mark can’t help but smile at that, unbuckling himself as well. He rests his hand on the door handle. “Now I know you need food. You don’t get to talking like that until at least dinner has been had.”

“It’s practically midnight snack time,” Jack supplements. The door unlocks, and his gaze flickers down to it. “Where to?”

“First place that looks nice, I imagine,” Mark murmurs, stretching his legs for the first time since the beginning of this particular section of their road trip. “Feeling anything in particular?”

His companion steps out of the car, and Mark hears the crack of his shoulders. Goddamn, he needs to visit a chiropractor, or start doing yoga, or something other than hunching over like a gargoyle. Jack shoots him that little side-eye, indicating he knows exactly what Mark’s thinking and is definitely not going to make an effort to change anything.

He’s such a brat. But he’s Mark’s brat, for sure. 

They have a habit of parking at the weirdest places. Mark doesn’t like to waste their money on parking unless they absolutely have to, so parking in big retail places that run 24 hours is usually his go-to. This time they’ve ended up in a well-lit, well populated shopping center, a few clothing stores marking the stretch, some jewelry places, and a couple of mini-cafes that sound really, really good right now. 

Jack’s already running up to it before Mark can even make the suggestion. 

A soft bell jingles upon their entrance, and there’s that single, solitary moment at which Mark has no idea what to expect. This is a small town, he thinks, one where everyone knows everyone, if he were to wager a guess, and in places like this, he always braces for the worst. Even if he believes in the good of people. It’s got a couple of people scattered throughout the booths, looking more of a diner than a cafe, but he sees the energy radiating from Jack, bouncing on the balls of his feet.

“Hi, darling,” a waitress approaches, her hair tied up in a loose bun, a deep, unnatural red, a name tag slightly tilted with the name _Aurora_ scrawled onto it. “Just the two of you?” 

Mark approaches from behind him, slipping his arm through Jack’s with ease. He expels that breath he’d been holding. “Yeah, just the two of us.”

She grabs two menus from behind the little stand. “Right this way.” 

Jack offers him one of his blindingly bright smiles. They follow her to a little table tucked into the back, right by the window. 

They sit across from one another. The barely visible light from outside creates almost a purple wall to his left, but the swirls in the sky still flicker into view. It’s like something out of a painting. 

“Can I get you something to drink?” she asks, tilting her head between the two of them. 

Mark looks back at him, thoughtful, pensive, like he’s going to get anything else other than, “Coke?” 

“Sure,” she scribbles it down onto her pad. “And you?”

He doesn’t get the words _tea_ out before Jack’s already rattling it off to her. He gives him a wink, and Mark can’t help but snort, before confirming this. 

The place is not the highest quality, and Mark knows this for sure. But there’s an atmosphere, a soft radio playing overhead, words he can’t make out, yet comforting all the same. This place feels like being wrapped in home, and Jack’s jiggling leg beneath the table only adds to that. 

Aurora returns with their drinks, and after a bit of debate, they order whatever special is on tonight. It’s kind of a routine--the first night they’re staying someplace, they get whatever people recommend, because the best way to know a certain culture is the food. It sounds good, whatever it is, Jack practically buzzing as she gives the affirmation. 

Sunlight fades, the star drooping its sleepy head beneath the horizon, the barest glimmers of light still present. The room fills with that yellow, motel sort of light, but the kind that is dirt cheap but stupid comfortable. Jack reaches a hand across the table, palm up, and he takes it with ease, noting the bizarreness of their contrasting skin tones.

How is it that Jack could spend so much time in LA before this little road trip, and still look a hair’s breath away from death? 

Wild, that boy. 

They don’t speak for a bit, enjoying the presence and contact. As the night falls, the diner becomes more animated, whispers turning into talking, turning into laughing and conversation. As much of an introvert as he is, it feels good to be wrapped within other people’s lives, even as background static. 

“So I take it you cuties aren’t from here?” Aurora says as she brings them their food. It smells divine, whatever it is. “We see all kinds. Let me guess, Seattle?” 

“Close,” Mark replies. “LA. Ohio, originally, but I moved out to LA sometime back.”

“And you?” she turns her attention to Jack, who’s already halfway into a spoon of food. Pasta of some kind. “You don’t look like a Californian.” 

Jack smiles with that mouth of adorably crooked teeth. “I’m from Ireland, actually.” 

“That’s the accent I was hearing,” Aurora snaps her fingers, pleased with something for sure. Mark always finds it cute how people try to guess his accent--he doesn’t sound stereotypically Irish, thats for sure. “Far from home.”

He shrugs, starlight blue eyes flickering back to him. “I’m a writer. I spent all my days following the words and worlds of others. But I fell in love with a man across the ocean with a stupidly pretty voice and a story so vast that words couldn’t do it justice. I realized that to follow him, I couldn’t just sit at home all day. So I worked my ass off to reach him.”

The tea he’d been drinking gets a lot harder to swallow. Jack seems amused by his reaction. 

Aurora pats him on the shoulder gently, jostling him from his thoughts. In a faux whisper, “Now _this_ one’s a keeper, sir, if you don’t mind me saying.” 

“Don’t I know it,” Mark says coolly, like he’s not having a bit of an internal meltdown over beautiful, perfect, absolutely endearing Sean McLoughlin. What a little shit. 

Dinner comes and goes smoothly, their waitress chatting with them with the air of old friends rather than a first impression. When other customers roll through the doors, she greets them with the same vigour, and occasionally, a few of them will walk over, and she’ll introduce the two of them as _the new couple in town_. 

It’s well into the evening when Mark and Jack roll out, arms locked together, swaying to a tune that only the two of them can hear. Mostly because Jack’s humming some nonsensical song that Mark has never heard, and if he has, he can’t remember the words. The tall street lamps blind them overhead as they make the short trek back to the car. 

“Let’s go find the stars out here,” Jack says, once they’re settled back inside. “I bet they’re beautiful out in the open.” 

“Know what else is beautiful?” Mark asks as he starts the car. He puts it into drive, the rumble of the engine overtaking the cabin for just a moment.

“Yeah. Me.” 

Mark bawks out a laugh, slamming on the break to lean his head against the steering wheel. Thank god no one is behind him. “You are unbelievably vain, Sean McLoughlin.”

“Says the guy who spends longer in the bathroom in the morning than all of my sisters combined,” Jack quips back. “Are you more than just a pretty face?”

“I dunno, am I?”

He begins driving again. Jack lets out a thoughtful hum, long and considerate. What little light of the town begins to dribble out, the long stretch of road nothing but darkness past them. Surely there’s a field to find?

“I’d think so, yeah,” Jack says, after a while. “You’re more than just a pretty face, I mean. You got a cute butt, too.”

“I was hoping you’d say that,” he laughs. “Cute face, cute butt, what more could you want?”

Jack’s warm hands touch his forearm, not asking for attention, but the subtle acknowledgment, the contact that sets him at ease. He knows that Jack is nearly all goofs and no seriousness, at least unless he has to, so the gentle brush of his fingers is a comfort. 

“Couldn’t want anything more,” he whispers, quiet. That moment lingers for a good few seconds before Jack jumps up, pointing, “There! That place looks break-in-able!” 

“It’s an open goddamn field, Jack,” Mark chides. “I don’t think it’s illegal.”

“Let me have some fun you overgrown Ken Doll,” Jack sticks his tongue out, and it’s amazing how he knows this, even in the dark, and even by not looking at him. “Can we go there?”

Mark’s already pulling off on the side of the road, and he lets that be his answer. 

Jack and he meander out into the grassy field. It’s not a movie style scene by any means, the road at their backs, the grass all short and scratchy. This doesn’t seem to bother his favorite boy as he flops down into the dirt, patting the space beside him. There’s room for two beneath the stars, and this is a blessing Mark doesn’t take lightly. 

When he lays down, Jack snuggles up to him, their heads touching. Mark finally turns his attention to the sky, the deep bluish black of the sky swirling stars around. There’s so many more than he ever sees in California, where light pollution is rampant. It’s the kind of shit you only see in paintings, and to be here, at this moment…

“God, I love you,” Jack breathes out, and he can feel the vibrations of his throat. “I love you so much.”

“I’m sure God loves you too,” Mark feels Jack’s body tighten, like he’s trying not to laugh.

He nuzzles closer, though, as if they could get any closer. “That’s good. But I...I’m serious, Mark. I love you so much.” 

Mark closes his eyes, letting the words soak into his skin. He’s heard them countless times by now, has heard them in so many tones of voice, not limited to this one, but it never stops making his heart swell in his chest. “I love you too, Jack. More than anything.” 

“I could know every language in the world,” Jack murmurs, and he feels his lips brushing his shoulder. “I could write until my fingers turned blue. I could study the world until I’m dead, travel until I don’t know my own name, and I still wouldn’t be able to describe how much you meant to me.” 

Shifting onto his side, Jack’s blue eyes look back at him, bright and wide and full of so, so much love and adoration. Their noses brush, and Mark leans in, pressing a gentle kiss to his lips. 

Though chaste, it lasts a while, enjoying the contact of one another, the easy breathing between them. 

“Don’t waste all your energy here,” Mark says, shifting back, coaxing him to lay his head on his shoulder. Jack does so without complaint. “It’s amazing, yeah, but. We’ve got so many places left to see, here. And the rest of the world after.” 

“To the rest of the world, then,” Jack agrees, and Mark can’t think of a single person he’d rather be with to see it all.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos are always appreciated. Thank you so much! 
> 
> Like what I do? Consider supporting me on my [Ko-Fi](https://ko-fi.com/A234MZ4)!


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